276 THE NATURAL HISTORY 



amidst the general havoc : hence men should learn to 

 ornament chiefly with such trees as are able to ■withstand 

 accidental severities, and not subject themselves to the 

 vexation of a loss which may befall them once perhaps in 

 ten years, yet may hardly be recovered through the 

 whole course of their lives. 



As it appeared afterwards the ilexes were much injured, 

 the cypresses were half destroyed, the arbutuses lingered 

 on, but never recovered ; and the bays, laurustines, and 

 laurels, were killed to the ground ; and the very wild 

 hollies, in hot aspects, were so much affected that they 

 cast all their leaves. 



By the 14th of January the snow was entirely gone ; the 

 turnips emerged not damaged at all , save in sunny places ; 

 the wheat looked delicately, and the garden plants were 

 well preserved ; for snow is the most kindly mantle that 

 infant vegetation can be wrapped in ; were it not for that 

 friendly meteor no vegetable life could exist at all in 

 northerly regions. Yet in Sweden the earth in April is 

 not divested of snow for more than a fortnight before the 

 face of the country is covered with flowers. 



LETTER LXII 



There were some circumstances attending the remark- 

 able frost in January 1776 so singular and striking, that a 

 short detail of them may not be unacceptable. 



The most certain way to be exact will be to copy the 

 passages from my journal, which were taken from time to 

 time as things occurred. But it may be proper previously 

 to remark that the first week in January was uncommonly 

 wet, and drowned with vast rains from every quarter : 

 from whence may be inferred, as there is great reason to 



